Author
Topic: The Last War (Read 125185 times)

OOC: sorry likewise didn't really pay much attention just wanted to get in there! my apologizes.

IC: Holly fell backwards onto her back the net making it very hard to do anything. The huge stones began to drop all around. Holly round this way and that trying her best to get away from them. There were hundreds of them dropping out of the sky. Holly fumbled around in a pocket that she could reach within the net and managed to pull out a small pen knife which she started hacking at the net with as much as she possibly could. Gradually after rolling sidewards five more times she managed to cut through the mesh and could pull herself free the only thing was that the lead weights were still wrapped round her ankles and were determined not to budge an inch. Holly rolled again to avoid another huge stone. She fought vigorously with the weights at her ankles trying to cut the rope tying them together. But it was to close to her skin. Each time she managed to fray a bit of the rope more blood started to pour down her leg. She looked up just in time to roll out of the way of another huge stone. But this stone caught the lead weights underneath it. Holly tugged and tugged at them to break them free but it wasn't working. Holly looked above her and curled into a little ball as another huge stone came crashing down above her head.

The stone dropped inexorably from the height of the high ceiling above. Silently it fell toward Holly's unprotected head. But Lord Belzar smiled and waved his index finger once more. The stone disappeared just as it touched her skull, and then reappeared behind him, landing with a "thud" at his end of the room. He called across to the woman who struggled in the net, "Not yet, child. Not yet. I have some friends, too, that I want you to meet!"

He sat down heavily on the rock, not smiling now. He pulled off one gauntlet, and carefully undid the metal latch on his plate mail over the other arm and examined the wound. Grimacing with pain, he probed the bleeding hole where the arrow had entered.

"What sort of arrow penetrates Krulltas plate-mail?" he wondered. "Stranger yet, to where did it disappear?" He summoned a healing bandage to hand, and pressed it carefully into place over his arm. Then, a healing potion, which he drank after pulling back the scowling helmet and mesh screen. Exhaling heavily, he replaced the headgear.

Belzar stood up and noted with satisfaction that the two intruders were gone. Utterly crushed under a pile of heavy rubble. He looked across at the king of Halbad.

"Now, your highness, if you are done trimming the shrubbery, we should talk."

Belzar touched the throne, then swept his hand in a dramatic gesture. The throne disappeared and reappeared on the other side of the portcullis next to the king. The summoner smiled wickedly under his mask and spoke again, "You seem rather... tense. Perhaps you would like to sit on your dead brother's throne to help you... relax."

The King of Halbad was unmoved, his face bore the stormy countenance of a winter storm brewing over the cold depths of the ocean. "Belzar, I should have expected such boorish behavior from you, pretended to the throne." The king said. "But in all of your precautions, and all of your plans you have overlooked one important fact, one fact so important that all of your magic can do nothing to erase it. I am the King, installed by the people and by rites both divine and arcane. I wouldnt expect a petty usurper to know about such things." The King said. The sword languished by his side.

<best to fight fire with fire, so saith Duncan the Exorcist unto Logan the Monk>

The King waved the stones away from the others, sending the great blocks of masonry into the walls. "Petty tyrant, pretender, usurper, thief. you shame all of those guilty of such acts Belzar. Summong the Black Wind? For that you will find no forgiveness. I shall leave your corpse not even fit for carrion birds and rats." All the while a strange lambent glow, almost a flame danced around the king and the spectre of the bugbear was gone from sight.

IC: Upstairs, Grumple found the big door. Door wouldn't open. The door latch thingie was gone. Tall man was there, and smelled... well, highly flammable, as usual. The armoured lady was there, too, but she didn't seem very happy. Grumple paid them no attention. Tantus was inside. Grumple knew it. He threw himself mightily against the door. 250 pounds of agitated troll wearing 50 pounds of steel struck the iron-reinforced oak. "SLAM".

Nothing happened.

Grumple knew he had to get to Tantus. He raised the heavy battle-axe, then paused. Tantus was not calling; not now. Grumple listened carefully for a moment, even though it wasn't his ears that had heard Tantus before.

With a roar of rage, Grumple swung the axe into the heavy timbers. A huge chunk of wood flew away from the door, not even falling to the ground before the axe swung again. This was no longer just an agitated troll, ordinary or not... Oh, no.

The king hurled the stones aside revealing a translucent shield of energy covering Rory and Baldwin. It was only inches away from their bodies and the shapes of their bodies could be seen within. It was the color of eggshells and if any touched it they would find it smooth to the touch with the hardness of steel...

Logged

"Pain can be your greatest ally, from pain you can learn to apply it, endure it and avoid it. Without pain there is no understanding of reality. If you never get hit with the things you strike out with every thing you know is pure fiction."

Holly struggled further with the bindings around her legs. But each time she tried to pull them away they seemed to tighten around her ankles. Holly looked to the door and saw a small inch of bright light coming from the hallway on the other side. She heared the angry grunts of the troll outside "No you must leave here at once" Shouted Holly apparetly to no one in particular. some may of thought she was losing her mind but others would understand she was trying to warn someone.

"I will not strike you down so long as you cower in your stolen throne, Belzar. Stand and face me like a man." The King said, his face was livid with anger. "Draw your blade if you have a shred of honor left inside that husk you reside in."

"Bravo, your Highness," sneered Lord Belzar, "That is an inspiring speech. Divine right of Kings and all that. Honorable swordplay. Surely you spent all night a-pacing to get it right."

"But where were you when your miserable subjects suffered? When that greedy fool Malik sucked at the marrow of their pitiful bones? Your city is a festering pit compared to Palaten when it was ruled by your brother and better."

"Even this little stripling" he said, nodding at Holly as she squirmed in the net, "...would rule as well. Better yet, methinks, under my careful "guidance"."

He looked across at the splintering door as an axe blade struck through it and was then withdrawn. "But, if you'll excuse me for JUST an instant, I believe someone is knocking."

A man in robes stood nearby, with a throne behind him. Grumple didn't care about the man in robes. There was an iron grate dividing the room, and a man at the far end dressed in black metal. Grumple didn't care about black metal man.

There was Hol-lee on the floor in a net. Now, THAT, Grumple cared about. Grumple burst in to save Hol-lee.

Unfortunately, Grumple didn't see the big egg thing, and tripped over it with a clatter of chain mail. His axe slid across the floor beside Holly. At that instant, a large fishing net fell over him. Grumple rolled and struggled with the net.

Black metal man called out from across the room. "Well, well. It's the troll! And right on time. You could have just knocked, you know. Voramis, wrap up the creature. It's my holiday present. Along with the girl."

Voramis circled carefully around the translucent shell covering Rory and Baldwin. He was mindful of the sword that was encased within; could FEEL the light and heat that hungered to slice into him, to burn him, to shred his consciousness.

"Is this how the demon Greshellalion felt before the Desecrator of the Unholies cut out his hearts?" the spider collective wondered. Ordinary swords would do little to him, but Voramis wondered if he could survive for long against such an enchanted weapon as Final Judgement.

Thus preoccupied, he pulled off a glove, made of the thinnest black leather, and held the exposed hand over the troll. Silk poured out of his arm, billowing down copiously over the netted creature, adding to the binding.

-------------

As you might imagine, this did little to soothe the agitated troll. Very little. Grumple struck out with a flailing kick that knocked over the little black man, who fell upon the net. Then, Grumple got one hand through the net around the little black man's throat. It collapsed instantly. The clothing came apart. Spiders poured out of his neck hole!

They crawled like a furry ball over Grumple's face and started squirting sticky web-stuff in his eyes and mouth. This made Grumple mad. So Grumple did what Grumple does best.

Grumple ate them.

Swooped a big fuzzy handful through the net into his mouth and stuffed them in. Chewed them as best he could into a gooey brown mass, then swallowed them. They squirped out between his teeth and stuck in his throat, so Grumple had to fumble in his tunic for a loaf of bread to shove in his mouth under the netting and choke everything down.

(Fortunately, Grumple just happened to have one. More than One, actually. At least, uh, three. One never knows when one may need to devour zillions of spiders in a hurry, as I'm sure you would know.)

It all took some doing, eating unfriendly spiders in a net on the floor with only one hand loose and all, but hey, when you've got talent (and good looks), you've got it all.

With his free hand, Grumple slapped the partly-empty clothes on the back. Another huge ball of spiders fell out. Grumple ate them, too. A horrible hissing, squealing sound burned into his mind, but Grumple wasn't paying attention to that.

Instead, a song the little girl used to sing long ago ran through Grumple's head.

His consciousness drifted to and fro, unfettered by responsiblity and decision, free of the demands of leadership. It was peaceful. Although somewhere in the inky silence in which he floated was the nagging preception...the feeling that there was something that he had to do. The inkling of danger...

It wafted past his being evading his senses. Unconscious, his brow furrowed in agitation. Then the old familiar voice returned, speaking to every fiber of his being..."wake up..."

Logged

"Pain can be your greatest ally, from pain you can learn to apply it, endure it and avoid it. Without pain there is no understanding of reality. If you never get hit with the things you strike out with every thing you know is pure fiction."

Odat Stumbled into the room. Through the fog that clouded his mind he knew that he had to do something. He just couldn't wrap his mind around what he could do. The problem was imperceptably large. The man in the black was the bad guy... The bad guy was bad.

Odat needed to...wait...what was that thought again. His mind struggled to consume another piece of the puzzle. Odat needed to stop the bad guy. That was it. Odat needed to stop the bad guy, but there was a gate between him and the Bad...wait...what was that thought. The Bad guy was bad. That was it.

Odat had been standing in his drunken stupor for some time after the door had come down when he came up with an ingenious idea. He picked up a rock.

Wait...why was he holding a rock...he was supposed to throw it...but why was he throwing a rock...he was throwing a rock because...Wait, what was that thought...the Bad guy was bad...He was supposed to throw a rock...what was the connection...everything was so hard.

After several moments of standing there with a rock, his mind grasping at the simplest of reasoning, and unable to maintain even that line of thought, he still didn't know why he was throwing it, or even what he was throwing it at, just that he was supposed to throw it for some reason

Odat finally gave up and threw the rock. In truth, it was one of the large bricks in the wall, and too large to pass through even that large Gate. The boulder however, rather than smashing into the gate and falling off, hit with enough force to break the corners of the boulder off and travel right on through towards Belzar who was otherwise occupied in his dispute with the King.

The boulder connected solidly with Belzar's chest, sending him through the air, in a deafening crash against the wall that cracked the stone behind him.

OCC: I've tried to make it clear that Belzar is sort of community property. I laid down some thoughts, but I recognize that it is very difficult matter to carry out a good one-on-one fight scene when you must wait for another player to respond after each sentence or two. SO, you folks are really, really smart, and if you need to move Belzar around and do stuff in character, I don't mind. I would ask only that you don't kill him (or Kraggis) since I think they're interesting. That's just me.

IC: Lord Belzar was startled, to say the least, by a large brick that flew across the room and hit him squarely. By the black horde! How did that man do it? The summoner prepared to respond in kind, but paused. He was feeling poorly, and had been using magical forces rapidly over the past hour. The poor feeling bothered him most. It had been years since he had felt so weak; many, many years; and not nearly enough. He had to focus.

That was difficult. The scream from Voramis was unsettling. Belzar saw the living carpet of spiders abandon the flimsy clothing and scurry away through the portcullis and off into dark corners. Voramis would have to take care of himself.

Belzar needed to take care of himself as well. The troll was the key. And Miss Mayleaf. He could ignore the King, the drunk, the other intruders for now, but the troll... the timing would be critical.

One. Summon to hand the vermillion lance of the lamprey, from his darkest treasure horde.

Two. One step to the left, then a jump onto the inscribed circle of runes on the floor. The symbols he had prepared only a short time ago. The mysterious patterns ignited in a burst of light where Belzar touched down... and he instantly disappeared.

Three. Reappear without pause on similar floor markings at the other end of the divided Keep. Right between the troll -- who was dangerously close to getting free of the net -- and the mysterious shell over the girl's friends. One fast step, then,

Four. The key... Belzar stabbed with the lance as hard as he could into the body of the troll. The monster roared deafeningly, but already Belzar was back on the markings on the floor and disappeared. Gone.

Only the lance shaft clattered to the floor to mark the spot where the summoner had been. The head of the insidious weapon was where Belzar had planted it... jammed into the center of Grumple's ribs, next to his still-beating heart.

The roar of pain ended, and there was a moment's silence as Grumple drew a ragged breath -- it was then everyone realized that Lord Belzar was no longer in the room. He had fled, for now.

Baldwin opened his eyes. He was ripped from the comfortable place. Final Judgment stung in his hand. Hot leatherbound handle electric with wanting. Evil was close. There was a moment of disorientation. Floor? Ceiling? Milk white took his vision with shadows dancing beyond. Rory lay next to him. Something was wrong. He tried to move. Could not. Seized by the closeness of his brother's spell. Claustrophobic. Slow the breath.

"Rory!" He touched his brother, mindful of the left leg that was obviously injured but shot thru with glowing with veins of the same milky stuff that served as their prision.

"Pain can be your greatest ally, from pain you can learn to apply it, endure it and avoid it. Without pain there is no understanding of reality. If you never get hit with the things you strike out with every thing you know is pure fiction."

Floated where all silence was heard, all sound was silent. No smell, no taste, no feeling, but all were there to be sensed nonetheless. Without age nor rank; totally and utterly alone, but tied to all planes of existence at once; he paused here before moving on.

The nexus, where all things began, and all things touched at their tangents. The one point in common but owned by none.

Belzar reflected, as he always did. He had opened a portal with youth and strength hundreds of years ago, some-where time had meaning. As he had been taught, before he excelled all summoning masters known before him. The portal had brought him here, where "here" meant nothing, nowhen, nowhere.

He experienced the doors, rather than saw them. Untold thousands, millions, greater by far than the stars on a clear night. They floated near and far, above, beside, and beneath, in the creamy distance. Familiar doors. Fantastic doors. Unimaginable doors. Of all sizes and shapes. Where they had come from and where they went was unknown to anyone. Only the most ancient tomes had spoken of this place, and that only in vague, dreamy rhymes. The verses floating on the scrolls.

But Balfors Belzar had found it. The nexus. It was the source of his power, for it made possible the summoning. Anything he could mark he could bring through here to where he was, with proper preparation. Ripping ANYTHING through more than time and space to hand, to use.

Sometimes he saw things at the nexus. Things that may be living or not. Moving far away; sometimes near by. Tiny and near? Sometimes. Huge and far? Sometimes. He could only judge them by the doors they entered and exited. Some doors were so large that when he neared them, they seemed large enough to swallow a planet. Or more. Sometimes much more, beyond any scale, beyond all reason. It was enough to drive you mad.

But Balfors Belzar was not mad. He sometimes willed himself near one or more, but did not enter any that were not familiar. The danger was beyond belief. Somehow he knew which were of his home world, and that was enough for him. Those he used, he marked with his mind. There were other marks on some doors as well. He recognized only a few of those marks, a tiny mental picture of the most powerful summoners and demons he had met, and sometimes defeated.

A malicious presence was growing. The keepers. Formless, but deadly; seeking life. They noticed those who tarried in the nexus. He had seen them once absorb an unbelievably powerful entity of sun-like energy. Balfors Belzar had no wish to contest such beings. Time (?) to go.

He willed himself to a nondescript door that floated nowhere. Here. He put forth his will and it opened. And shut behind him.

Lord Belzar stepped out from the symbols on the floor, into the secret cavern where he would be safe to rest, and to plan his next move.

Baldwin felt compelled to touch Final Judgment to the white surface surrounding he and his brother. There was a sucking sound as it dissapeared seeming to be pulled into the sword itself. Free of confinement, Baldwin stood on wobbly legs. He looked about the room for the Shambler and Belzar. Little was left of the Shambler and Belzar was nowhere to be seen. He looked about to ensure his companions were alright. Rory was unconscious and his leg was shot through with white glowing viens of unknown orgin. To Baldwin it seemed whatever it was, was helping mend the leg so he left it and his brother alone.

"GRUMPLE!"

Grumple was in bad shape, worse than Baldwin had ever seen. It looked as if there were a few loaves of bread seasoned with spiders stuffed into his mouth and he had suffered a nearly mortal wound from the broken lance that still protruded from his chest. The wound could yet be mortal. Blood flowed.

"Where's Arthur?" Baldwin glanced about...

Logged

"Pain can be your greatest ally, from pain you can learn to apply it, endure it and avoid it. Without pain there is no understanding of reality. If you never get hit with the things you strike out with every thing you know is pure fiction."

Belzar relaxed in the vast cavern far, far away, feeling the health flowing from the troll across the spectral aethers to his own body.

"Limitless health, from the limitless fount bubbling up from a fast-healing troll! I should have done this centuries ago." he chuckled to himself, lying on a soft couch, sipping a rare wine. He glanced at his arm. The wound had already closed and the scar tissue was fading before his eyes.

"There is nothing like a Troll in Thrall! Hmmm, where did I hear that before? No matter. Soon, I'll be restored. Then, I'll get that brat for Melgrittzigym."

With Baldwin's help, Grumple got to his feet, and out of the net. He staggered over to Hol-lee and pulled off her fetters as well. "Grumple! Are you all right?" she cried out, as she steadied his form.

"Grumple hurt... here." He pointed at the center of his chest. He poked his finger through the hole in the chain mail under his left armpit where the metal point had penetrated, and pulled on the broken bit of ebony wood.

"ARRRGH!" the troll moaned, but gritted his teeth again and yanked harder. "ARRRRRRGH-GRAZZIX!" louder... but the barbed obsidian head of the lance happily let go of its wooden shaft, and remained inside beside Grumple's heart.

It had found its new home, and it wasn't going anywhere.

Grumple sat down heavily and stared at the broken piece of lance shaft in his hand.

Arthur, of course, was still outside the castle absorbed in his book. It was fascinating. The concepts were fresh, and the methods ingenious. Whoever had written this book was at least a Grand-Master Mage. The wealth of knowledge was stunning, and truly, Arthur admired the author of the book.

Arthur was not sure that he agreed with the way that the writer saw the world. It was very nihilistic. Still, Arthur did think that the writer was accurate on a few points. Certainly, there was a lot of evil in the world, and people deserved worse punishments for their crimes than the legal system allowed, but this man's views were way out of proportion to all reason. It was hard to ignore the dark picture that this book painted about it's author.

Hawever, despite the dark tone, the book was mesmerizing. It was a completely new way of thinking, and Arthur was utterly absorbed by it. Or almost utterly. Deep beneath the surface, in the deepest depths of his heart, he was angry and hurt. Angry because Baldwin had persuaded Kethal and the others to leave him out here, and hurt because Kethal had let him.

"Pain can be your greatest ally, from pain you can learn to apply it, endure it and avoid it. Without pain there is no understanding of reality. If you never get hit with the things you strike out with every thing you know is pure fiction."

The King glowered at the spot where the usurper had been, at his chance to avenge his slain kinsman, and rival - the King of Palaten. Belzar had taken the yellow road and run away with his tail between his legs. He turned to face the band of heroes who had entered the room to challenge Belzar. He sheathed his sword and looked at them, seemingly bearing the weight of the entire castle of Halbad on his old shoulders. His face was drawn and thin and the stains on his royal robes made him look more the tattered.

"He has escaped...again." The King said. He looked down at Grumple, at the blood flowing freely from the wound. "I do not know the design of his plans, but I do know that Belzar has bound this troll to him. I would thwart his plans at any crossing. Damar, bring me the kingsfoil clippings." He commanded.

Holly knealt by Grumple and left on hand lingering on the trolls knee. This was terrible they should of left then none of this would of happened. Belzar wouldn't be getting at Grumple, Rory wouldn't be hurt, Baldwin would be better and she wouldn't have any more to worry about. Holly sighed and looked around the room at the throne Belzar had been sat in. He tormented her tremendously. Bringing her fathers throne to this place and him sitting it just made her mad. "We have to get out of here. We have to get that spear head out of Grumple and then we must leave" Holly turned and looked at the throne again. She walked over to it the metal gate had dissapered by now. Holly walked right in front of it and fell to her knees. Her fathers form seemed to shadow in the seat. Holly bowed deeply and then stood up. she turned back to the others "What are you waiting for. The king has given you an order Do it." Holly sighed again and sat on the floor her back pressed up against the wall and her face in her hands.

Grumple staggered over to the smouldering heap of vegetation in the corner. It was withered, shriveled, with the leaf edges singed brown, and several nasty gashes oozing syrupy sap that congealed into a brown puddle around it. Grumple reached out and touched the woody mass with surprising tenderness.

"At-ta?" he growled, then lowered his voice to a sonorous vibration that reverberated into the chests of those who felt, rather than heard, the words.

"<Aaat-Taaa? Aaat-Taaa Frrrrreee, Grrrroooondaaa Brrrrrennnndo Soggg-gerrraaal>?" the troll rumbled, and pounded on a prominent tree-trunk for good measure. Then he sat down on the floor, and coughed heavily while clutching his chest.

The shambler twitched a few leaves, and then in deep tones that could only be felt, responded. Grumple stopped coughing for a minute to listen, then spoke again. This went back and forth a few times between the old acquaintances.

Grumple nodded. He knew then what he had to do if he made it but the shambler didn't. Atta-Freema-Vernus asked Grumple to care for his pet Venus Fly-Traps back in the Sog Lands. They always were hungry at the end of the warm time and needed to store up strength for the cold.

And in exchange, should the end turn out differently, At-ta had promised to root Grumple's body deep into the rich, dark soil by the bridge outside Palaten -- where in a world filled with men, a troll might find peace.

Having thus gotten their worldly affairs in order, both collapsed in their respective heaps; the troll leaning against the sturdy bog-shambler. Grumple satisfied himself with one more look at his friend Hol-lee, who stood there safe and healthy... as Grumple's friends should always be but to his shame, seldom remained. Then, his eyes closed and he began snoring loudly; the reverberations of which rattled the various trunks of the bog-shambler (and pretty much everything else in the Keep).